[tech] New Cameras in UCC

[Nick Bannon]

On Tue, May 05, 2009 at 11:33:59PM +0800, mitch at ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au wrote:
> As some of you are aware there has been 4 new cameras installed in UCC, 

Good to see projects in progress. Cameras are quite fun, I've helped
play with them at the UCC since the unwieldy chain of machines that got
images from [THO]'s framegrabber onto the 'net. Clearly there's going
to be more and better capturing in the future.

[...]
> Does anyone see an issue with this happening, YES for the mean time  
> these cameras are not going to be publicly viewable, This WILL change  
> once the system is working.
>
> If you urgently require view access to these cameras your welcome to  
> logon to http://camwhore.ucc.asn.au:8990/zm/index.php with Username view 
> and Password view

I don't quite understand this - in the meantime, that link and
view:view account _is_ working. It is publicly viewable, right? Which
at least is close to the status quo with the current webcams,
http://webcam.ucc.asn.au/ .

I do feel uneasy about new, clearer, faster webcams. Each and every
one - a bland sign on the door "You may be recorded" is not actually
conveying the reality of the situation if you can't see the picture the
camera can see. They're fun to play with, they might have some upsides,
but the cameras have been abused before and they will be again.

However, there is the gotcha that recording devices are small and cheap -
it'd be really hard to enforce a camera ban even one you wanted to, so one
might have to live with it and have rules about making them transparent
rather than pretend half the people here don't carry a handful on their
person as a matter of course.

http://lists.ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au/pipermail/ucc/2002-September/008408.html

I think that any club cameras should be public ones. If a camera watches
you, you should have direct access to its footage; if it's watching a
public place, its footage should be public. Wouldn't it be useful if a
URL was printed under every camera?

On Wed, May 06, 2009 at 09:48:47AM +0800, Alex Dawson wrote:
> Can we also have it opened up to UCC members anywhere, instead of just  
> the clubroom? It's nice to be able to see who is in there before making 
> the trek in.
[...]

That's true, that's a real day-to-day practical benefit, not just a hope
that we'll catch a thief after the fact once in a while.

I do see a potential transparency benefit in publicly logging access to
the captured data, and discouraging collecting it wholesale (and slagging
the network link?) or republishing it.

On Wed, May 06, 2009 at 10:23:32AM +0800, mitch at ucc.gu.uwa.edu.au wrote:
> I have actually made a PHP page that shows all current and New Cameras, 
> It wouldnt be hard at all to throw this onto an apache-ssl server.

Is that the "Montage" link?

Nick.

-- 
   Nick Bannon   | "I made this letter longer than usual because
nick-sig at rcpt.to | I lack the time to make it shorter." - Pascal